International Association of Friends of the Soviet Union
international organization
The International Association of Friends of the Soviet Union was an organization formed on the initiative of the Communist International in 1927, with the purpose of coordinating solidarity efforts with the Soviet Union around the world. It grew out of existing initiatives like Friends of Soviet Russia in the United States, the Association of Friends of the New Russia in Germany, and the Hands Off Russia campaign that had emerged during the early 1920s in Great Britain and elsewhere.
Organizational history
Establishment
In 1927 the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics celebrated the 10th anniversary of the Russian Revolution with much fanfare. Supporters of the Soviet Union flocked to Moscow to attend the official Revolution Day festivities slated for November 7. The Communist International decided to make use of this opportunity to bring together representatives of the various national "friendship societies," centralizing their activities in a single international organization to be known as the International Association of Friends of the Soviet Union. An organizing committee for the new association was named, with representatives of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the Communist Party of Great Britain playing a leading role.
The founding congress of FSU was held at the House of the Trade Unions in Moscow November 10–12, 1927. 917 delegates from 40 countries assisted the conference. Leading figures in the organization were Clara Zetkin and Henri Barbusse. National sections of FSU was formed in various countries.
“International Association of Friends of the Soviet Union” enters the record as international organization. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what International, Association and Friends can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 19, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3390451. VIAF identifies the subject as 124994907. The Library of Congress control number is n85014900. None of the 2 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1927.
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This entry incorporates text from “International Association of Friends of the Soviet Union” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.